Ömer Özkizilcik

Turkish research director at the Omran Center for Strategic Studies. He is Ankara-based analyst on Syria, Turkish foreign policy, counterterrorism, and military affairs. Özkizilcik has written extensively on the non-state armed groups and the state actors involved in the conflict.

From 2017 to 2019, Özkizilcik worked as a research assistant at the Middle East Foundation in Ankara. From 2019 to 2021, he was an analyst at the security studies of the SETA Foundation in Ankara and had a special focus on Syria-related military and security developments, including non-state armed groups and counterterrorism efforts. Furthermore, from 2016 to 2024, Özkizilcik has been the editor-in-chief of Suriye Gündemi, a Turkish online news and expert portal about the Syrian civil war. Since 2024, he is also in the official representation body of ULFED.

Özkizilcik holds a bachelors in Social Sciences from the Humboldt University of Berlin and a masters degree in International Relations from the TOBB University of Economics and Technology.